Tonight was the first night of  All-Star Gorilla, at the Fringe Bar, 7pm Sundays 5, 12 and 19 of May, part of the current Comedy Festival.   Not only do I get to make up comedy on-the-spot with a bunch of lovely co-conspirators, I also had the fun of creating the mask for our new gorilla, Dru.

I wasn’t the person-in-the-suit tonight, but have worn it a couple of times to promote the show.  Being a gorilla completely changes the way it feels to hand out flyers to the public – people smile and take the things from you nearly every time, rather than that explicit ignoring thing which street promotion usually engenders.   It is of course very hard to ignore a shaggy beast, especially if she’s being cute and friendly.

These late-season Monarchs will probably seek an overwintering place rather than breed now – and so live three times as long as their summer-born sibs.

If this was North America, they’d be flying thousands of kilometers to Mexico for the great (if threatened) butterfly migration, as in this dazzling footage.  My internet research suggests that these will probably go no more than 20 kilometers to find a sheltered conifer tree.  Even that seems a long journey for something as wind-tossable as a butterfly!

My own secret thrill for the next few weeks will be seeing the posters on derelict buildings, alleyway walls and other such poster-posting places around the town, along with small stacks of flyers competing for attention with other flyers on coffee shop counter tops.   In the category of “details no one will ever consciously notice”, the background here includes a swimming unicorn, a hand drawn rainbow and a sunset from a trip down the Nile I took a few years back.  The central couple were part of an Eclipse Photographic shoot five or six years ago, for a completely different WIT show – but some looks never go out of style.   The satin in the foreground is a Photoshop tinted picture of my old red petticoat.  Sometimes commercial stock pictures just don’t have the elements you need.

This tiny tintype is, according to the back, Miss Amanda Fish.  She would probably not have been a dazzling beauty even in her own time, but she has made a heroic effort to present herself to best advantage, wearing elaborate earrings, a velvet bow with a brooch, and a top with fancy shiny buttons.  

Her gaze is wonderfully intent.  Was she having her portrait taken to give as a gift to some special man or woman?  I’ll probably never know (nothing showed up with a quick online search anyway), but I can enjoy speculating.

Miss Fish may well make her way into a drawing or painting sometime soon.

These are a few examples I managed to snap between explaining the cameras’ m button to people.  Most of are 8-15 second exposures, and made using cheap coloured finger led lights and glow bracelets from the $2 Shop, some <$10 laser pointers, and (for the multiple exposure ones) with an old flash unit – by pressing the “test fire” button two or three times per photo.

Spent some time last night working out camera settings and such for an upcoming night photography workshop, using a couple of budget laser pointers.  Welding goggles and/or padding was worn under masks to keep eyes safe.